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LTE Advanced is so 2014. We’re already on to the next big thing. Verizon is now 50% faster … and still slower than T-Mobile!

That’s why I was cracking up at Verizon’s breathless “LTE Advanced” announcement last week. Really? LTE Advanced? That same technology (2 channel carrier aggregation) has been available to T-Mobile customers since 2014 , and we’ve already rolled out 3 channel carrier aggregation too.

These advanced technologies are alreadylive for T-Mobile customers in 425 cities across the country. And, it’s a big reason T-Mobile has been crushing the competition in LTE speed for years according to three independent sources OpenSignal, Ookla and even the FCC. Customers on America’s fastest LTE network already experience typical download speeds of 7-40 Mbps and typical upload speeds of 7-20 Mbps. (Ouch. I’m sure it’s frustrating for Verizon to be #2 even with all this LTE Advanced stuff they’ve already deployed!)

Verizon loves to scream about the massive amounts of money they’ve spent on their network over the last decade. It is a staggering, mind-blowing sum of money. But, here’s something even more mind-blowing: Verizon has spent billions on their network, and it is still slower than T-Mobile, and Verizon still won’t (or can’t) offer unlimited data.

I will hand it to Verizon. They did some cool marketing. And, I really can’t blame them for trumpeting LTE Advanced two years too late. This is what they have to do with their older, slower network. Every couple years, they rebrand it. Remember Verizon XLTE? It’s all but gone. Now, it’s Verizon LTE-A. What’s next? Verizon LTE-BS?

Look, in reality, carrier aggregation is not new. It’s so 2014. That sound you heard from T-Mobile last week was a great big yawn. We’re already on to the next big thing.

Today, I’m proud to announce that we’re first (again) to introduce new technology that delivers a massive 2x speed boost to customers. 4x4 MIMO (multiple input, multiple output) doubles the number of data paths between a cell site and your phone. Double the paths = up to double the speed than before!

This new advanced technology is available NOW in 319 cities. Customers with the Samsung Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge will be able to use this new technology with a software update later this month, and more phones will support it soon.

But, we’re not stopping there. Today, we’re also first to launch another new technology – 256 QAM (quadrature amplitude modulation) for downloads and 64 QAM for uploads. These new technologies increase the number of bits delivered per transmission for even faster speeds. In fact, combined with 4x4 MIMO, 256 QAM delivers download speeds up to a blazing fast 400 Mbps.

256 QAM and 64 QAM are already live in half our network, and by end of October, we’ll light up every single cell site across our nationwide network. Customers with the Samsung Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge will be able to use this new technology with a software update in October, with more phones on the way.

We’ve already launched seven LTE Advanced technologies – more than anyone else in the industry. (For those keeping score, they are VoLTE with eSRVCC, Carrier Aggregation, CoMP, SON, HetNets, EVS and higher order modulation.) Already, one of those technologies – Voice over LTE (VoLTE) – carries roughly 60% of calls on our network, far more than any of the carriers. Our LTE Advanced is so much more advanced than the competition, it ought to be called LTE Advanceder®.

While carriers like to announce every. single. device. they test in the lab on new technologies, the Un-carrier acts. We put new technology to work for our customers in the field, not in press releases.

But, equally important as our technology leadership is coverage. Today, I’m also proud to announce T-Mobile now covers nearly 312 million! That’s right. Verizon’s claimed coverage advantage is gone. We cover 99.7% of the people Verizon does. Now, almost everyone can choose a faster, more advanced network from T-Mobile – a network that can handle unlimited with more cell sites and more spectrum per customer than Verizon. A network that already carries 55% more data per customer than Verizon.

There’s a reason Verizon and AT&T don’t offer everyone unlimited high-speed data and have been running away from it for years – their networks just can’t handle it. Their networks were built when a phone call was the #1 smartphone app – not Instagram or Pokémon Go or Snapchat. Their network was not built to handle the massive amounts of data people use today. T-Mobile’s network was built a generation later with newer technology – and it was built for how people use smartphones today – for massive amounts of data!

With every new technology-first we deliver, we build on our LTE Advanced foundation and extend our leadership. We’re not just pushing this industry forward on things like service contracts, overages, international roaming and unlimited data. We’re pushing this industry forward on next-gen technology, too – beyond LTE Advanced, towards 5G and towards a future where people can just use wireless without worry or fear.

There’s a reason T-Mobile customers are the most satisfied and T-Mobile customers are more likely to recommend the Un-carrier than customers of any national wireless company. It all starts with our blazing-fast, super-advanced network – that just got a lot faster and more advanced. If you haven’t tried it lately – trust me, you simply haven’t tried it at all!